Otto; or, Up with Dead People2008

Name: Otto; or, Up with Dead People
Genre: Zombie, Comedy Horror, Psychological
Released: 2008-01-19
Rating: 5.2

“Is it possible to come back from the dead?”

Directed by Bruce LaBruce

5.2

Crypt Score

Blended from 4 sources

IMDb 5.2Rotten Tomatoes 47%Metacritic 34TMDB 5.3

✍ Review

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Year

2008

Runtime

94 min

Box Office

Revenue (worldwide)

$11,295

Domestic

$11,295

🏆 1 win & 1 nomination total

The premise

A young zombie named Otto appears on a remote highway. He has no idea where he came from or where he is going. After hitching a ride to Berlin and nesting in an abandoned amusement park, he begins to explore the city. Soon he is discovered by underground filmmaker Medea Yarn, who begins to make a documentary about him with the support of her girlfriend, Hella Bent, and her brother Adolf, who operates the camera. Meanwhile, Medea is still trying to finish Up with Dead People, the epic political-porno-zombie movie that she has been working on for years. She convinces its star, Fritz Fritze, to allow the vulnerable Otto to stay in his guest bedroom. When Otto discovers that he has a wallet that contains information about his past, before he was dead, he begins to remember details about his ex-boyfriend, Rudolf. He arranges to meet him at the schoolyard where they met, with devastating results.

Horror Vault's take

A disoriented young zombie drifts into Berlin with no memory of his former life, finding an unlikely sanctuary in the city's queer underground scene. When a maverick filmmaker spots him as the perfect subject for her ambitious zombie epic, Otto becomes both muse and mystery — a creature caught between the living and the dead, longing for a past he can barely grasp. Director Bruce LaBruce blends political provocation, arthouse sensibility, and genuine pathos to craft a zombie film unlike any other. Equal parts elegy and satire, it asks what it means to be truly seen in a world that fears what it doesn't understand.

Content: Explicit Sexual Content, Nudity, Depictions Of Homophobia, Graphic Imagery